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David discovers that his wife left for another man, and is escorted to a hotel. The hotel manager reveals that singles have 45 days to couple, or to be transformed into an animal; his dog is his brother, an example, to which he chooses a lobster, due to life cycle. The hotel has many rules and rituals relationship-focused: masturbation is banned but sexual stimulation by the hotel maid is mandatory by example, and guests attend dances and watch propaganda extolling advantages of partnership.
David makes acquaintances with a man with a lisp and a man with a limp, who become his quasi-friends. The limping man explains that he was injured in an attempt to reconnect with his mother, who had been transformed into a wolf. The lisping man is caught masturbating, and the hotel manager burns his fingers in a toaster. Limping man, told a woman has arrived who limps, says he knows but she limps from an injury that will heal so she is not a suitable match. Relationships apparently require partners to have a distinguishing trait in common. Limping man instead wins the affections of a nosebleeding woman by purposefully nosebleeding. They move to the couples section to begin their month-trial partnership.
Residents can extend their deadline by tranquilizing natives in the forest; each captured "loner" earns them a day. On one such hunt, a woman with a fondness for biscuits offers David sexual favors, which he declines. She tells him that if she fails to find a mate, she will kill herself by jumping from a hotel window.
David later decides to court a woman known for being heartless, but their initial conversation is interrupted by the screams of the biscuit-loving woman, who has severely injured herself jumping from a window. Although he is troubled by the incident, he behaves indifferently to the woman's suffering to gain the interest of the heartless woman. He later joins her in a jacuzzi, and she feigns choking; when he does not attempt help, she decides to start their trial. She then kills David's brother and when David cries in response, she concludes their relationship is a lie. He escapes capture and, with the help of a sympathetic maid, tranquilizes and transforms her into an animal.
David escapes the hotel and joins the loners in the woods. In contrast, they forbid any romance, with mutilation as punishment. David, who is short-sighted, begins a secret relationship with a short-sighted woman. They develop a gestural language for communication. They are taken on covert missions to the city, where their cover requires them to appear as lovers, which they secretly enjoy.
The loners launch a raid to sabotage the work of the hotel. David tells the nosebleed woman that her partner has been faking his. Other loners hold the hotel manager and her husband at gunpoint, tricking him into shooting his wife to save himself, but the gun is not loaded, leaving the couple to face each other.
The leader finds the short-sighted woman's journal and discovers her plan to escape with David. The leader takes the woman to the city, ostensibly to have an operation to cure her short-sightedness, but blinds her. When David discovers, he overpowers the leader, leaving her for death by wolves. They then escape to the city and stop at a restaurant. Seeking to reestablish commonality, David goes to the restroom and prepares to blind himself with a steak knife.
